“I am going to kiss you now,” I tell him, and proceed to do exactly that. I rise on my toes and press my lips to his, and the world explodes in a festival of feeling. Neither of us is familiar with the concept of kissing, but his lips are soft and I like them. I like touching him. I want to touch him as I have never wanted to touch another person. I want us to kiss longer and deeper. Kissing him is like getting that little bit of myself back. That bit of myself I lost so long ago. Our kiss is flavored by tears, though I don’t know whose tears they are.

The first thing he says when we finally stop kissing is “This doesn’t change anything.”

My mouth falls open and I gape at him. “How can you say that?” I demand. Why doesn’t he realize how much courage it took me to touch him?

“You will leave me behind again the next time there is danger. Or perhaps you will intentionally deflect all attention, all danger, to yourself because you think yourself dispensable.”

“I don’t think that!”

He looks at me with those eyes that see too much. I look away from him, but I don’t let go of his hand.

“All right, maybe you have a point. A tiny little point, but it’s not because you are weak. It’s because you are precious to me.”

“Haven’t you ever thought that you are precious to me as well?” he replies.

“I…” I look at him, bewildered. I sit down on the bed, and he sits down next to me. Actually, honestly, I haven’t.

He sighs and his arm snakes around my waist to pull me softly against him. “I am in love with you, Paheli. When you put my tear on, you unintentionally and unknowingly became my companion. I spent nights curled up in a cage, sometimes hurt, sometimes bleeding, feeling what you felt. The place Baarish kept me was dark; there was never any light, but through you, I could see the sun. Baarish used to talk to me after torturing me for a day. He used to tell me my only purpose in life was to provide him with my tears. He sat on a stool outside the cage and talked. He told me I was useless. That my parents threw me away. That no one would ever love me. He didn’t know that I had you. Your pleasure when you eat mangoes, your anger, your fear, your sadness. I feasted on your feelings. They were so much more than the bleak despair that composed my days.”

I am crying so hard, I feel dizzy.